Saving Georgia

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has announced that Moscow is
putting on hold hostilities in Georgia, apparently due to the pleas
from the U.S. and Europe to cease aggression against Georgia. Many
questions remain open, including:

Signature and stability of the cease-fire;

The timing of the Russian withdrawal from sovereign Georgian
territory;

Recognition of full Georgian sovereignty and territorial
integrity; and

Terminating attempts by Moscow to remove Georgian leadership by
force.

The threats to Georgia's political survival and to Southern
Caucasus states' independence have not disappeared, and Russia's
massive use of force against its small neighbor remains appalling
and deeply troubling.

As the Olympic Games opened Friday, August 8, the tragic and
ominous conflict between Georgia and Russia erupted as well. Moscow
responded with overwhelming force to the Georgian fire on
Tskhinvali, capital of South Ossetia. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin
flew from the Beijing Olympics to Vladikavkaz, taking control of
the military operations. Putin sidelined his successor, Dmitry
Medvedev, thereby leaving no doubt as to who is in charge.

The 58th Russian Army of the North Caucasus Military District
rolled into South Ossetia, reinforced by the 76th Airborne "Pskov"
Division. The Black Sea Fleet blockaded Georgian coast and shelled
the strategic port of Poti. Cossacks from the neighboring Russian
territories moved in to combat the Georgians as well.

Following the third day of heavy fighting, and after rejecting
the Georgian cease-fire offer, Russia has struck far beyond
contested South Ossetia, opening up a second front in Abkhazia.
Pushing deep into Georgia, the Russian Army has seized military
bases and several towns including Senaki and Zugdidi, as well as
the key Georgian city of Gori, the birthplace of the Soviet tyrant
Joseph Stalin. By taking Gori and the east-west highway passing
through the town, the Russians have effectively cut the country in
half, severing its main transportation artery.

Russian forces have also bombed the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan
pipeline, the only avenue for exporting Central Asian energy, which
is independent of Russian control. Throwing aside any pretense of
"stopping a genocide," the Russian troops pushed forward and, on
Monday evening, were 20 kilometers away from the Georgian capital
Tbilisi. There is a good chance that these troops will advance on
Tbilisi in the next 24 hours.

Russia's goals for the war with Georgia are far-reaching and
include:

Expulsion of Georgian troops and termination of Georgian
sovereignty in South Ossetia and Abkhazia;

"Regime change" by bringing down President Mikheil Saakashvili
and installing a more pro-Russian leadership in Tbilisi;

Preventing Georgia from joining NATO and sending a strong
message to Ukraine that its insistence on NATO membership may lead
to war and/or its dismemberment;

Shifting control of the Caucasus, and especially over strategic
energy pipelines, by controlling Georgia; and

Recreating a 19th-century-style sphere of influence in the
former Soviet Union, by the use of force if necessary.

Rebuilding the Russian Empire: The Challenge to Europe's Status
Quo

Russian relations with Georgia were the worst among the
post-Soviet states. In addition to fanning the flames of separatism
in South Ossetia since 1990, Russia militarily supported
separatists in Abkhazia (1992-93), which is also a part of Georgian
territory. Russia also had a cantankerous relationship with
then-Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze, the former Soviet
foreign minister, whom hardliners in Moscow blamed for the Soviet
withdrawal from Central and Eastern Europe. In the 1990s, there
were two assassination attempts against Shevardnadze, and elements
of the Russian state, such as secret services or military
intelligence, came under suspicion both times.

Russia has long prepared its aggression against Georgia's
pro-Western President Mikheil Saakashvili, in order to undermine
his rule and prevent Georgia from joining NATO. Despite claims
about oppressed minority status, the separatist South Ossetian
leadership is mostly ethnic Russians, many of whom served in the
KGB, the Soviet secret police, the Russian military, or the Soviet
communist party.

In recent years, Moscow granted the majority of Abkhazs and
South Ossetians Russian citizenship and moved to establish close
economic and bureaucratic ties with the two separatist republics,
effectively enacting a creeping annexation of both territories.

The use of Russian citizenship to create a "protected"
population residing in a neighboring state to undermine its
sovereignty is a slippery slope that is now leading to a redrawing
of the former Soviet borders. Brave voices asserted that Russia
lost the moral right for peacekeeping in Abkhazia and South Ossetia
when, circumventing the leadership of sovereign Georgia, it

became close friends with the de facto organs of power of these
self-declared entities. Now, casting aside any decency, bringing
airborne units into Georgia, bombing territory that isn't even part
of the former South Ossetian Autonomous Republic, Russia …
has become a party to an armed conflict.

No valiant Western voice issued this statement. As has so
frequently been the case throughout history, the above-mentioned
statement was made by a pitifully small but morally righteous group
of Russian human rights activists, led by Lev Ponomarev, Sergei
Kovalyov, and Yelena Bonner (Andrey Sakharov's widow). The group
proceeded to call for Russia to be expelled from the Group of Eight
(G-8), and for the United Nations, the Organization for Security
and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), and the Parliamentary Assembly of
the Council of Europe (PACE) to impose sanctions on Russia.

Chilling Language, Strategic Actions

Aggression against Georgia also sends a strong signal to Ukraine
and Europe. Russia is playing a chess game of offense and
intimidation. Former president and current Prime Minister Vladimir
Putin spoke last spring about Russia "dismembering" Ukraine,
another NATO candidate, and detaching the Crimea, a peninsula that
was transferred from Russia to Ukraine in 1954 when both were
integral parts of the Soviet Union.

Today, up to 50 percent of Ukrainian citizens speak Russian as
their first language, and ethnic Russians comprise approximately
one-fifth of Ukraine's population. With encouragement from Moscow,
these people may be induced to follow South Ossetia and Abkhazia to
Mother Russia's bosom. Yet Ukraine's pro-Western leaders, such as
President Victor Yushchenko and Prime Minister Yulia Timoshenko,
have expressed a desire to join NATO, while pro-Moscow Ukrainian
Party of Regions effectively opposes membership. NATO opponents in
Ukraine are greatly encouraged by Russia's action against
Georgia.

Beyond this, Russia is demonstrating that it can sabotage
American and European Union (EU) declarations about integrating
Commonwealth of Independent States members into Western structures
such as NATO. By attempting to accomplish regime change in Georgia,
Moscow is also trying to gain control of the energy and
transportation corridor which connects Central Asia and Azerbaijan
with the Black Sea and ocean routes overseas--for oil, gas and
other commodities.

A pro-Russian regime in Georgia will also bring the strategic
Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline and the Baku-Erzurum (Turkey) gas
pipeline under Moscow's control. Such a development would undermine
any options of pro-Western orientation for Azerbaijan and Armenia,
along with any chances of resolving their conflict based on
diplomacy and Western-style cooperation.

The West's Hour of Truth

The United States and its European allies must take all
available diplomatic measures to stop Russian aggression. To uphold
the international order, to repel aggression, and to advance our
national interests and those of the West at large, the U.S.
should:

Send Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to Europe to
coordinate support for condemning Russian aggression in Georgia
among our allies. The U.S. and Europe should lead the world in
demanding that Russia withdraw all its troops from the territory of
Georgia and recognize Georgia's territorial integrity;

Convey to Russia that its invasion of Georgia has forfeited its
membership in the G-8 and may derail its aspirations to join the
World Trade Organization and to host the 2014 Winter Olympics in
Sochi, only 200 kilometers from Georgia;

Push for great powers to speak out, including Germany, France,
India, Brazil, Japan, Korea, Turkey, and possibly China. This
support would "globalize" the condemnation;

Continue pressure within the United Nations Security Council
and the General Assembly to achieve a resolution that will voice
full and unequivocal support for Georgian territorial integrity,
including Abkhazia and South Ossetia, and for Russian troop
withdrawal;

Send international observers to Georgia from OSCE, the EU and
the United Nations in order to expand mediation efforts to withdraw
Russian forces;

Begin talks at a neutral forum such as the OSCE to finally
settle the South Ossetian matter as well as future Abkhazian
problems. This can be done by granting these territories full
autonomy within the Georgian state, as Tbilisi has repeatedly
suggested;

Reiterate NATO's position on Ukraine, which holds that the
country will become a member of NATO through the extension of a
Membership Action Plan and that the member states look forward to
assessing Ukraine's progress at the December 2008 meeting;

Announce the deployment of amphibious ships into the Black Sea
as a non-combatant Evacuation Operations, which will be coordinated
with all Black Sea littoral states; and

Offer humanitarian assistance to Georgia, such as aiding the
wounded and refugees, and evacuating the friends of the U.S. if
necessary.

Beyond this, the United States, its allies, and other countries
need to send a strong signal to Moscow that creating
19th-century-style spheres of influence and redrawing the borders
of the former Soviet Union is a danger to world peace. The U.S. and
its European allies should communicate to Moscow that its
aggression will not stand and cannot be accomplished without
irreparable harm to Russia's international standing for decades to
come. The U.S., its allies and Europe must do everything possible
to stop the aggression against Georgia.

Ariel Cohen, Ph.D., is
Senior Research Fellow in Russian and Eurasian Studies and
International Energy Security in the Douglas and Sarah Allison
Center for Foreign Policy Studies, a division of the Kathryn and
Shelby Cullom Davis Institute for International Studies at The
Heritage Foundation.

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Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has announced that Moscow isputting on hold hostilities in Georgia, apparently due to the pleasfrom Washington as well as European capitals to cease aggressionagainst Georgia.

This report discusses:

About the Author

Ariel Cohen, Ph.D.Visiting Fellow in Russian and Eurasian Studies and International Energy Policy in the Douglas and Sarah Allison Center for Foreign and National Security Policy, a division of the Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis Institute for International Studies, at The Heritage Foundation

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